WARNING: THIS ARTICLE IS MEANT FOR BAREFOOT & HUARACHE RUNNERS ONLY
RUNNING EFFICIENCY MECHANICS
By
leaning slightly forward,
your
center of gravity inevitably
forces
your legs to
step
in,
to
prevent
you
from
falling.
If
you
aim
those steps in a way that allows the body’s fascia to coil and
uncoil like a spring, your
running
efficiency increases
in
orders of magnitude. Aiming your steps in a
specific
manner initially requires total focus and concentration. Yet, over
time
the body takes to it naturally. Below is a
step-by-step
description
of
how to aim
those
relatively “forced”
steps,
in
a way that
achieves
higher
running efficiency.
While keeping your center of gravity forward, make sure your shoulders are fully frontally facing, and swing your arms back and forth as if you were throwing punches in coordination with the opposite foot you switch into, as you step into the following cycle:
As your foot touches the ground, the hip over it should align with the big toe (as seen from your perspective)
The flatter the foot is as it lands, the greater the pivoting leverage achievable from raising the arch’s OUTER EDGE,
Purposely aligning your landings on an imaginary mid-line traced on the ground in front of you, makes it considerably easier to repeat the cycle, than if you allow each foot to land along their individual shoulder-width imaginary lines
Increasing the number of cycle-repeats (higher cadence), radically increases your running speed
IN DETAIL
Aim to hit the ground’s mid-line in front of you, on your foot’s mid heel’s OUTER EDGE. (see Figure 1, above).
The foot strikes nearly FLAT on the ground and “moves” forward only by pivoting up the arch while rolling from the outer edge towards the ball of the foot & big toe (INSIDE EDGE), as if it were pinned on the ground.
As you pivot up the arch, while transferring your body weight from OUTER EDGE to INSIDE EDGE, aim to squeeze the ground under your foot, this turns the knee inward, as the foot reaches the top of its arch and allows you to “spring forward off” the ground from the big toe.
By the time the tip of your big toe has taken off, your other foot is about to strike the ground on its OUTER EDGE so that it can repeat the same cycle, as it starts it all over again, but on the opposite foot.
PLANTAR
FASCIITIS (REALLY FASCIOSIS)